Comments on: Why Does a Meeting Need Buckets?

By: Things to Eliminate | Red Three Consulting

Things to Eliminate | Red Three Consulting — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 15:14:33 +0000

[...] I have been thinking more about the idea of Elimination and I remembered a post I read a while ago by Joanna Rothman on eliminating meetings altogether. I remembered it because of a great visual – [...]

By: Keith

Keith — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 16:51:38 +0000

Buckets are good representations of what need not be in the room. Getting rid of the tools that the people need is not a good idea. Status meetings in general are a bad thing. They are a monumental waste of time. We don’t have enough time for ritual if we are to deliver on time and perfect (the only the customer ever really wants).
If you have to have a meeting like this, make sure you specify the exact time it will start (and then start it on time), what will be covered, what and who has to present, time out the whole thing and know exactly what time it will end (and again, end it when it’s time no matter what). Make people be effective, set the expectation for preparation and execution and your people will follow. If they don’t, have that one on one and figure out how to get it right.

By: Jim Ward

Jim Ward — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 16:45:33 +0000

The serial status meeting saves the managers’ time (in their view) and most of them don’t really care about wasting the time of their subordinates. Both time saving and time wasting are especially prevalent where several subordinates are working on independent projects and the manager must report status on all of them at a similar meeting with his or her management, and so on up the line.
In my experience, managers are not often problem solvers, nor are they action item oriented. Too many managers are administrators cum water carriers. Serial status meetings are part of their culture. They shy away from one-on-one contact as this can be threatening. Therefore, isolating one factor, such as status meetings, for change, will not make them any more effective as managers. Meetings are a tool that managers can use effectively. But if they don’t know how to manage changing the tool set won’t help and may actually harm the organization.

By: Andrew Walker

Andrew Walker — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 04:03:21 +0000

Johanna, I agree with your comments, however I have attended several meetings recently (mostly about short term future direction) with influential senior managers who could have really taken a leading role – but were sidetracked by their Blackberrys or laptops. The content of the meetings was very engaging and I could have benefitted from their experience and input much more with their wholehearted attention.

I think that some senior managers and executives are almost expected to respond to their communications in real time – possibly making them less than 100% effective in circumstances like these.

By: Hana Galperin

Hana Galperin — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 14:45:42 +0000

Status meetings are a dread. I know managers that believe that in this way they will synchronize between their team members, but this happens rarely. Try computing the cost of those meetings and then think about the benefits…
But even one-on-one status meetings need some form. I request of each team member to prepare each week before the meeting one page outlining:
1. Tasks done last week, marking which ended, which require additional work and a list of open issues.
2. Task planned to be done next week.
I found out that the preparation in itself helps each team member to better organize his work and improve his estimations, the meeting itself is shorter and more effective and I have a clear vision of the progress.

By: Dwayne Phillips

Dwayne Phillips — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 14:08:34 +0000

Johanna,

Keep spreading the word on this concept. Maybe one day the “let’s go around the table” status meeting will die. Hopefully before I do.